SCHOOL BUDGET CUTS PROPOSED; RECOMMENDATIONS STILL SOUGHT

New proposals for reducing the Cape Girardeau School District's deficit were presented at a Board of Education meeting Monday night.

The district's operating fund balance is expected to dip to $400,000 by the end of the current fiscal year June 30. That is about $600,000 below the state's recommended balance of 10 percent of estimated expenditures.

Superintendent Dr. Dan Tallent said the district will experience growth of about $500,000 in local revenue next year because of construction, meaning another $500,000 must be cut from the budget.

The administration last month solicited written recommendations from staff and the public regarding ways to reduce next school year's budget by about $1 million. The reductions should correct past overspending.

Tallent's preliminary recommendations to the board included $215,000 in savings by freezing spending at all levels. This would include freezing salaries across the board, eliminating incentive grants that require matching funds, reducing a cafeteria plan that administrates staff payroll withholdings, reducing the district's maintenance and repair budget and reducing local expenditures for textbooks.

Another $285,000 would have to be cut from other areas of the budget.

Some of the teachers were among the approximately 100 people who attended told board members that salary and staff reductions would result in low staff morale and a bad reputation for the district that could result in resignations and fewer quality applicants.

Reductions in the number of teachers, whether by retirements, attrition or layoffs, will lead to increased teaching loads and larger class sizes, said Walt Lilly, a biology professor at Southeast Missouri State University.

That reduction can result in an "unstable and unhealthy environment" for teaching and learning, said Lilly, who lives in the Cape Girardeau School District.

"When these consequences are coupled with a salary freeze, there is ample incentive for the best and brightest of our current teachers to leave," he said. "Similarly, it provides an incentive for the best prospective new teachers to look to districts other than Cape for their first jobs."

CTA president Brenda Woemmel restated teachers' concerns that a lack of staff input in addressing budget reductions will result in decisions that hurt the overall quality of education. She asked board members to schedule any meetings in which the budget would be discussed "at a time other than noon so teachers and members of the public can attend the meeting."

Tallent presented board members a revised list of administrative and public recommendations to reduce the deficit. When possible, estimates were attached to indicate the amount the district would save by eliminating a particular item, he said.

"We've received tentative information that about 14 staff members said they would take the retirement incentive, and that's what we're basing a couple of these figures on," said Tallent. "We'll continue to try and put some numbers with the recommendations we haven't been able to do so with so far, and we're still accepting input from the public."

Board members scheduled a budget study session for 6 p.m. April 2 in the Central Junior High School cafeteria. Depending upon the outcome of that meeting, a second study session may be scheduled or a special meeting will be called to approve a list of deficit reduction proposals.

Recommended Cape Girardeau School District budget reductions

The list of recommendations and their potential savings presented Monday by Dr. Dan Tallent, superintendent of schools:

-- Early retirement incentive used by 14 faculty members, $170,000.

-- Increased class size to be determined.

-- Eliminate additional preparatory period at secondary level to cover classes of eight of those teachers retiring. The other six positions would have to be filled. $170,000.

-- Eliminate extracurricular active pay for teachers, $130,000.

-- Eliminate extracurricular operating expenses, minus revenues, $120,000.

-- Eliminate additional days contracted, $100,000.

-- Reduce administrative travel by half, $7,000.

-- Administrative staff reductions: assistant superintendent, $60,000; assistant principal, $50,000; technology coordinator, $30,000.

-- Reduce athletic director's salary from administrative to teacher's salary, $19,000.

-- Eliminate secretary position at high school, $13,000.

-- Eliminate secretary position at board office, $13,000.

-- Expand bus-riding limit from one to two miles, to be determined.

-- Eliminate special education teachers and aides, to be determined.